The application thus of the neuter or intransitive verb or participle to an active sense, seems to be vicious idiom, yet Milton is chargeable with it.— And because the imperfections of great men must be imitated, Thomson amuses us with " Gazing the landscape,"—"The voice warbling the heart,' &c. &c. 112. "Methought I heard a voice cry, sleep no more! "Macbeth does murder sleep." This is all that the voice is said to have uttered; the rest," the innocent sleep," &c. is Macbeth's own speech, and is falsely put into Italics, as is also, for the same reason, a little lower down, the line and half, And therefore Cawdor "Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more. Methought I heard a voice," &c. The distinction above noted is judicious; a similar inaccuracy is to be observed in the following speech of Macbeth, 119: "Still it cried, 'sleep no more,' to all the house.' If the voice, according to this punctuation, said only, "sleep no more," the words that fol low might be omitted as superfluous, it being sufficiently clear that the sleepers in the house were those addressed; but the natural construction is, "Still it cried, sleep no more to all the house; "Glamis hath murdered sleep." i. e. There shall be no sleep any more to all those who are now reposing under this roof; Glamis hath murdered sleep. The following part, which, as it has been justly remarked, is Macbeth's own speech, approaches with a horrid solemnity that is inimitable. "And therefore Cawdor "Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no B. STRUTT. more. 115. "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood "Clean from my hands?" A thought resembling this, but with advantage, occurs in Hamlet "What if this cursed hand "Were thicker than itself with brother's blood, "Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens "To wash it white as snow." 120. "Your constancy hath left you unattended.” Hath forsaken you, left you by yourself. Show us to be watchers." To have been purposely awake, or on the watch. પ SCENE III. 131. Had I but died an hour before this chance, "I had liv'd a bless'd time." Besides the instance quoted by Mr. Malone, from The Winter's Tale; this thought occurs again in Othello "If it were now to die, 'twere now to be most happy." SCENE III. 138. " The near in blood, "The nearer bloody." Thus in K. Richard III. "Nearer in bloody thoughts though not in blood." 139. " -There's warrant in that theft "Which steals itself when there's no mercy left." Here is a jingle between "steel" and "steal," to steal itself away, and to steel or make hard itself by dismissing the softness of good manners. SCENE IV. "The heavens, as troubled with man's act, "Threaten his bloody stage." Shakspeare is very profuse of theatrical allu sions. 140. Duncan's horses broke their stalls, flung out Contending 'gainst obedience." Churchill has amplified on this prodigy, in the Ghost "The horses that were us'd to go Impetuous, from their stables broke, "And aldermen and oxen spoke." 141. "Make war with mankind." The metre would be saved by reading, with Pope, 149. "Mark Antony's was by Cæsar-he chid the sisters." Dr. Johnson's censure of Mr. Heath, who contended for the prosody of this line, might have been spared. The measure is not incompatible with the legitimate occasional licence in the structure of dramatic verse. "Mark An'tony's was' by Cæsar' he chid' the sis' těrs." See Introduction Note. 151. Put rancours in the vessel of my peace." Embittered my cup of happiness. 66 157. Acquaint you with the perfect spy o' the time.' Acquaint" is used imperatively, and the sense is obscured only by that common corruption of putting the accusative plural of the second personal pronoun into the place of the nominative: you for ye; acquaint ye i. e. learn, make yourselves acquainted. 160. SCENE II. Nought's had; all's spent, "Where our desire is got without content." When disappointment accompanies the possession of what we sought, we have in effect gained nothing; and we have lost that animating expectation which constitutes our chief happiness. I fully agree with Mr. Steevens here, in supposing that Shakspeare's metre was originally regular; but cannot admit of the offered correction in this place; an opposition is evidently intended between what had been lost and what had been gained, or "had." I would propose the rejection of "Madam;" "I will," submissively uttered, is sufficiently expressive of the servant's obedience. It has been remarked to me, by my ingenious friend Mr. Strutt, that these four lines, "Nought's had," &c. seem to be the property of Macbeth himself, who is supposed to be speaking them as he enters; and who, at the conclusion of them, is addressed by the lady. "How now, my lord! why do you keep alone?” And, indeed, the querulous spirit which they breathe is much more in character with Macbeth than with his wife. 162. Better be with the dead, "Whom we, to gain our place, have sent to peace." I think it strange that any editor should have made, and still more so that Mr. Steevens should applaud, the alteration from the first copy, of |